I saw vids on those two, the liquid tire chain I thought was a poor execution on a bad idea The Max Trac was the forerunner of traction control, but back in the day it was more fun and most times more effective to be able to spin your tires to get “un- stuck”
you mean like floor it to a buck ten and slide on out ? yeah I do that, damn I miss rear wheel drive. It was real fun in the 56 Chevy just give the wheel a spin and floor that 6 popper yeeeehaaaaa
Heck yeah! Spin them wheels A few years ago I was moving a customers car around outside, it was a small FWD thing, had traction control, I was in deep snow and had to stop for a fellow employee coming around the building, I went to go again and the engine was EEEE UHGGGGGGGGG, I DID move forward when it spun, but NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO, the computer knows best, "We must NOT have wheel spin!" My co worker knew how to turn off traction control, he shut it off, and my foot went to the floor EEEEEEEEEEEEEE spun my way outta the deep snow F traction control AND FWD!
The problem is that computers are programmed to deal with the lowest common denominator of drivers when it comes to dealing with slippery roads (and all kinds of other things in modern cars). I don't think I am a fantastic driver, but after several decades in the North East, I know enough about snow driving to dislike modern aids in most cases (high speed braking on snow is an exception, although I don't treat the brake pedal as a switch). Ironically, I was visiting Arromanches in Normandy some years ago. I drove my little rental car on a field that was softer than I thought and as I was trying to not lose momentum and get the car out of the field, a wheel began spinning and the engine cut off most power, and the car sunk into the mud. In an older car, I would have made it much further, or likely all the way back to hard ground.
Love the Bob Lutz interview. Very cool. Who thinks they are going to further in poor traction situations by flooring it?
Had a '59 Chevy Impala that had some type of traction control. It was basically a bag full of sand above each rear wheel in the trunk. My '95 Cougar had traction control that I could turn on or off with a dash mounted switch. Woke up one morning, my drive is uphill, the ground was solid ice. I barely made it to the car without falling. Traction control off the car wouldn't move on solid ice. Turned traction control on & was able to floor it & the engine wouldn't rev at all. Slowly but surely made it up the drive WITHOUT even spinning the rear tires. So the traction control was a good thing in this case. Tom T.
Traction control and ABS are mostly for people who treat pedals like switches. Now, modern traction controls apply brakes to wheels with no traction and those do help greatly, but there is nothing worse than being on a muddy or sandy surface where one could power out of, just to have engine power cut off and the car loses all momentum and gets stuck.
On my 2005 GMC truck I did headers, cam, and a custom tune. I had them remove the torque management as well as the traction control. This made it much better off road, no more bogging down. at a worksite I had a crew of guys call me with 2 trucks stuck in the mud. I went to see. Shut off the traction control, pinned the gas to the floor and drive right out. They were shocked
